The Arctic as seen by scientists

At other times, however, scientific analyses might provide deeper insights into processes which cause such phenomena that are, admittedly, simply magnificent to look at. For instance, take this photo captured by the fish-eye camera showing a homogenous low-level cloud: do you spot anything unusual?

Right, in the top right corner of the photo, you can observe cloudbow and glory. Adjusting the contrast of the photo helps identifying them:

Depending on parameters such as its phase, shape and diameter, each particle scatters light differently. Liquid water drops, for instance, tend to scatter light in the forward direction. But the scattering phase function also shows prominent maxima at scattering angles of approximately 138° and scattering angles greater than 175°, corresponding to the visible phenomena of the cloudbow and the glory, respectively. This way, a decent amount of light is backscattered at the water cloud and captured by the camera. Conversely, measurements of the cloudbow and the glory allow to derive cloud parameters such as the effective radii of the droplets. By the way, prominent maxima of the scattering phase function are also responsible for rainbows and haloes. Science and beauty are not mutually exclusive, quite the contrary...